You can puzzle your way to happiness

江蘇連云港東海教師進修學校 馬連振

幸福有時候很簡單：把愛好過成生活便是一種幸福！

題材 人物傳記 體裁 記敘文文章詞數358 難度 ★★ 建議用時6′

海詞積累

1.arithmetic n.算術

2.sudoku n.數獨游戲

3.craze n.狂熱；瘋狂

4.scrawl n.不工整的字跡；潦草的筆跡

When I was a little girl growing up in the seaside town,there was nothing to do but go to the amusement park on rainy days.I couldn't play on the machines because of no money.My father had left us after I was born, leaving my mum to bring up three children alone.The manager used to let me and my friends come in and play bingo.Although we weren't allowed to win prizes,it wasn't important to me: I just wanted to concentrate on the 1..

Looking back,I realize that my focus upon numbers is rooted in the financial poverty of my childhood. The love began when I started primary school.My teacher chalked some numbers on the board and told us we were going to learn to add them together.To my great excitement,we were each issued with an exercise book.I did the job very well and numbers were going to be my friends.Very soon I was moved up a year to join the older children.The challenge for me was not just getting the sums right, but doing them faster than anyone else. I wanted to be the quickest in the school at mental arithmetic.To practise it at home,I began to collect 2.books.As I fell further into the depths of my puzzle books,it became clear that I had found my calling.

It is not surprising that I always say“numbers are my 3.”.Who could have guessed that I would make a whole career out of numbers?For 26 years,I cohosted a quiz show named Countdown.And when the sudoku craze struck in last century,I spotted the trend in time to publish a“How To”book that went on to sell nearly three million copies worldwide.On the other hand,scrawls of numerical data on a screen make my little heart flutter（顫動）as well.

That's my idea of happiness.Give me a train journey,a pencil and a book of mindtwisting number puzzles and I'm happy.If the puzzles require new logical techniques and arithmetic tricks to be mastered,I will be much happier.

Reading Check

Fill in each blank with only one word according to the context.

Language Study

Sentence for writing

“it be not surprising that...” ……不足為奇

我總是說“數字是我的朋友”，這并不奇怪。